The Room of Requirements
by EnamoredWithSherlolly
Summary: Prompt from tumblr: Molly disappears every night after dinner, and Sherlock's determined to figure out where to...


"She's up to something. I know she is." Sherlock's eyes never left Molly even as he loosened his tie, leaning back slightly as she darted from one end of the table to the next, excitedly chatting with her friends.

"She looks fine to me." John shrugged and reached for another drumstick, glancing up for a moment and assessing the girl grinning at Meena and waving her arms animatedly before turning back to his food. "I think you're overreacting. What's she got to hide?"

Sherlock's eyes narrowed. "She's always gone after dinner. I've never been able to find her. Not once."

John snorted, nearly choking. He took a swig of party punch. "So you admit you _have _looked for her every night then?"

But the Ravenclaw who had just earlier so hurriedly pushed aside a Gryffindor next to John to talk to him wasn't listening. Molly had leaned down, given a final hug to her friend, and began walking down the hall to the double doors at the end. He jumped up, following her.

"You could just ask her, you know! It's been weeks!" he yelled after his best friend, but the curly-haired boy didn't hear him.

John rolled his eyes, a grin suddenly appearing on his face as he reached for the bowl of mashed potatoes that had just appeared next to his right hand. Just what he had been craving. With a final glance toward the blue robes disappearing around the corner of the doorway, he piled some of the mashed potatoes onto his plate, drowning it in gravy.

_Where was she going?_ As he followed her around corner after corner (nearly losing her once or twice, much to his horror), he began to hesitate. She was moving quite slowly, and not with much purpose, it seemed. Perhaps she simply liked to go for walks.

He immediately dismissed the idea. Nora would have told him if she had. He reached into his pocket, feeling little whiskers skim over his fingertips, then tiny paws scuttle onto his palm.

"She hasn't been walking around at all, has she?" he murmured to the white rat, stroking her fur. She squeaked. He quickly settled her back in his pocket, then peered around the corner, watching as Molly came to a sudden stop in front of a wall.

His eyes widened. A door began to appear, growing larger and larger out of nowhere. _Ah, so this was the famous room of requirements._He'd never thought those rumors were true, especially since the Marauder's Map also tucked in his pocket held no trace of the room anywhere, but it appeared his clever Hufflepuff friend had found it before him.

_She should have been in Ravenclaw._ Upon seeing the door begin to shrink, he sprinted for the door, opening it as gently as he could, then shutting it, letting the wooden frame slip lightly through his fingers to latch softly.

Before he even turned around, he knew where he was. The smell of acrylic paint filled his nostrils, and he could distinguish the slight hint of oil as well as paper. But when he spun around, nothing could prepare him for the multitude of easels sprawled out in front of him, aisle upon aisle of different colored paint cans (color coded and labeled) on the left hand side, the stacks and stacks of finished paintings to his right, all leaning against a wall extending as far back into the room, to the corner where the light didn't reach. Even for him, it was unbelievable.

The light flickered, and his eyes flicked over to the aisle of paint cans closest to him. He ducked behind him, easing his robes off his shoulders so he wouldn't accidentally knock anything over and reveal himself. He glanced at the paint can blocking his view to the rest of the room. 000FFF. Blue.

Gliding down the aisle, he held his breath, tugging his tie loose and glimpsing flashes of the rest of the room through the paint cans. After a moment, he finally heard footsteps, and following the soft treading, saw the chestnut hair he had been looking for.

Molly tugged her black robes off, pulling her hair from her ponytail and shaking it loose before loosening her own tie and taking it off. Sherlock unconsciously held his breath, feeling a twinge of disappointment as the soft waves of hair found their way back into the confines of a rubber band.

But then she walked toward the middle of the room, where a single easel lay, a large white cloth over it, and reached for the (barely) white robe covered with so many different paint splotches it looked polka-dotted, shrugging it on, and his earlier disappointment was replaced by an unknown anger toward himself, and toward her.

She liked to paint.

She liked to paint, and he hadn't known. He should have known. Why hadn't she told him? And how had he not realized until now?

_Stupid_. He thought back to the smudge of black on her cheek he had wiped away two weeks ago, thinking it was ink. The swirl of brown he had thought was dirt running down the sink as she washed her hands one week ago. The splotch of green on her white shirt he'd believed were grass stains! _Stupid!_ She had never been into horticulture. At least that much he did know.

She much preferred the company of the Hippogriffs out behind Hagrid's hut, and he had let that bit of knowledge blind him, believing she'd spent all her time over there. Which was why he had been so shocked, three weeks ago, when he didn't find her there. Hagrid said she hadn't ever been there outside of class. And he had been floored. He had made the key mistake he told others never to make. _Never assume._

He was shocked back into the present by the sound of rough cloth gliding over wood as Molly pulled back the canvas. But he couldn't see the painting from his direction to her front right, and there was no way he could simply walk out into the open, so he had to be content with simply watching her as she sat down and began to paint.

His gaze glided over the soft curve of her cheeks that jutted out a little further when she pursed her lips in thought, then the gentle pink of the lips he'd once said were too small without lipstick. He blinked. What was wrong with him?

After fifteen minutes, she finally dropped her brush, wiping her hands on the white robe.

"You can come out now, Sherlock." Her voice echoed in the large room.

His lips quirked up slightly. She was getting better at this.

"How long have you known?" He stepped out from behind the aisles, walking closer to her.

She pointed to the slight sliver of black laying just in view next to the aisle closest to the door. "You're slipping, Sherlock."

"Hmm. Or maybe you're just getting better. I would have no objections to taking you as an apprentice."

She simply smiled, taking off her robe and picking up the tie she'd draped over the wooden chair behind her. "I could have stopped you from coming in, you know. Just told the room I didn't want you in here, and you never would have been able to come in."

"Interesting. Why didn't you?" He picked at a tube of paint, rubbing his fingers together to feel the consistency of the black paint. The same consistency he'd wiped off her cheek two weeks ago. His gaze strayed toward her lips again. He looked away almost immediately.

"I wanted you to tell you something."

He nodded toward the painting. She smiled.

"Hufflepuff Commons in fifteen minutes." She shrugged on her robe, heading toward the door.

He raised an eyebrow at that. "So sure I can get in?"

She laughed. "That book on Hippogriff care didn't magically fly to my room on its own."

"Maybe it did. This _is_ Hogwarts. Anything could happen."

She grinned again. More and more, they'd experienced this lighthearted banter. "Fifteen minutes, Sherlock."

He nodded, heading toward the canvas as she slipped out the door. He felt his heartbeat quickening. He knew what she had painted. He didn't trust his intuition, only his senses, but his intuition told him he knew…

As he reached the painting, looking over the amazing details, he discovered he was wrong. He _had_ known the subject, but he hadn't known the intensity, could never have imagined the vivid blue of the eyes or the perfect cupid's bow of the lips of the dark haired boy staring back at him, an indulgent smirk on his face. A mirror image of himself.

Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes. Then he grabbed the white cloth from the floor, for some irrational reason reluctant to let anyone else see, despite the fact that he knew no one ever would unless Molly let him. But still.

And three minutes later, he was in the Commons, facing the girl lounging in a chair, reading "The Care of Hippogriffs and Other Fantastical Creatures."

"See? I told you you would make it without getting drenched in vinegar." She shut her book, placing it on the table next to her.

"Ah, you know me well." His eyes glinted. "Then you know my answer."

And suddenly Molly didn't look so confident anymore. He noted the slight tremor in her fingertips and the slight hunch of her shoulders. She bit her lip as she stood.

He wanted to shout in exasperation. As it was, he only let out a sigh. "For Christ's sake, Molly. It's yes. Of course it's yes!" He strode up to her, pulling her into his arms. "It's you. It's only ever been you."

She relaxed in his embrace, her arms raising to wrap around his waist. "I wasn't sure because you never - "

He leaned back but didn't let her out of the circle of his arms. "I bought you a birthday present."

She blinked at him.

"I even forgot John's birthday, but I didn't forget yours," he clarified.

"Oh." A shy smile appeared on her face, and she buried her face in his chest. "Thank you."

"Convention says that's what boyfriends do. Or, in my case, best friends who want to become boyfriends."

Molly quickly leaned up and pecked him on the cheek. "Regardless, thank you."

That was the first time she saw him blush.


End file.
